Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1887-04-01
KING
Solomon 5 Mines.
By n. RIDER HAGGARD.

l.
panw Obustards) and that they would pass
within fifty yards Of my head. Taking one
of the repeating Winchesters | waited till
they were nearly over u.s. and then jumped
on to my feet. On seeing me the paw
punched together, as / expected they would,
and | fired two shots straight into the thick
of them and as luck would have it, brought
one down, fine fellow, that weighed about
twenty pounds. In half an hour we had q
fire made of dry melon stalks, and he was
toasting over it, and we had such feed as
we had not had for a week. We ate that
paw: nothing was left of him but his bones
and his beak, and felt not little the better
afterward.
That night we again went on with the
moon, carrying as many melons as we could
with us. AS we got higher up we found the
air getting cooler and cooler, which was a
great relief 10 us, and at dawn, so far as we
could judge were not more than about
dozen miles from the snow-line. Here we
found more melons, so had no longer any
anxiety about water, for we knew that we
should soon get plenty OF snow. But the
ascent had now become very precipitous,
and we made but slow progress, not more
than a mile an hour. Also that night we ate
our last morseI of biltong. As yet, with the
tkttpLlDll VI tIlt tbuNs VIC iIhh F''ii A.' ~
ing thing on the mountain, nor had we come
across n single spring or stream OF water,
which struck us very odd, considering all the
snow above MS, which must, we thought,
melt sometimes. But as we aiterward dis
covered, owing to some cause, which 1t ~
quite beyond my power TO explain, all
the streams flowed down upon the north side
OF the mountains.
We now began 10 grow very anxious about
food. We had escaped death by thirst, but
1t seemed probable that it was only to die OF
hunger The events of the next three mlScr-
able DAYS are best described by copying the
entries made at the time in my notebook.
2lst May.-Started - a. NJ, finding the
atmosphere quite cold enough to travel by
day, carrying some watcrmclons with us.
Struggled all day. but saw no more melons,
having, evidently, passed out of their dis
trict Saw no game Of any sort. Halted for
the night at shutdown, having had no food
for many hours Suffered much during the
night from cold
Z5d.-Startcd mt sunrise again, feeling very
faint aud weak. Only made live miles to-
day; found some patches OF snow, Of which
we ate but nothing else. Cdmpcd ut night
under the edge Of great plateau. Cold bit
ter. Drank little brandy each, and hud-
died ourselves together, each wrapped up in
our blanket to keep ourselves alive. Are
now suffering frightfully from starvation
and WEAKNESS. Thought that Vcntyogcl
would have died during the night.
23d. -StmggIcd forward once more as soon
rs the sun was we'll up, and had thawed our
limbs Il little. We are now in dreadful
plight, and | fear that unless we get food
this will be our last days journey But little
brandy left. Good, Sir Henry, and UmbOpa
bear up wonderfully but Ncntvogcl is in a
very bad way. Like most IIottentots, he
cannot stand cold. Pangs OF hunger not so
bad. but have sort of a numb feeling about
the stomach. Others say the same. We are
now on Il level with the prccipitous chain, or
wall of lava, connecting the two breasts, and
the view is glorious. Behind us the great
glowing desert rolls away to the horizon,
and before us lies mile upon mile of smooth,
hard snow almost level but swelling gently
upward ont OF the center Of which the nip
pie Of the mountain, which appears to be
some miles IN circumference rises about four
thousand feet in the sky Not living thing
il to be seen. God help us, | fear our time
has come.
And now | VIII drop the journal, partly
because it is not very interesting reading and
partly because what follows requires per
maps ldtli'l d't'ulltN tillllE.
All that day che 23I May) we struggled
on up the incline OF snow, lying down from
time Ia time 10 rest A strange gaunt crew
we must have looked as laden we were,
we dragged our weary feet over the dazzling
PLAIN, giariu- round III with hungry eyes.
Not That there was much use in glaring,
for there WAS nothing to eat. We did not do
more than seven miles that dav Just before
nipple Of Sheba's LETT breast which lowered
up thousand Of feet into the air above us. a
vast, smooth hillocl of frozen snow. Bad as
we felt we could not but appreciate the WON
drru scene, made even more wonderful by
the dying rays Of light from the setting sun,
which hero and there stained the snow blood
red, and crowned the towering mass above
Nv with diadCm 81 glory
Il say" gaspcd Good, presently, I'VE
ought Ia be somewhere near the cave the old
gentleman wrote about"
YES" slid |, "if there is 4 cave
Come. Qr,trrman," rloanrd Sir Henry,
"dou't Gt,, like that; | have every faith in
the d,u; remember the water. We shall find
the place Soon.
al We don't find it before dark we are
dead men, that Is all about It," was my con-
soIatory reply.
For the next ten minutes we trudgcd az in
silence, when suddenly Umhopa who was
marching along beside me, wrapped up in
HIS blanket with y leather belt strapped SO
tight round his stomach To make his hun
ger small as he said, that his waist looked
like girls, caught ma by the arm.
Look he said, pointing toward the
srrngtng slope OF the nipple.
fpIlpNVptI bi,l pI,,,., .p,I ,,,r,.,{,.,1 ,..t,,g
two hundred yards from us what appeared
to be a hole in the snow
ut is the cave" said Umbopa
We made the best of our way to the spot,
and found sure enough that the hole was tho
mouth OF cave, no doubt the same as that
ot which Ia Stlvestra wrote. We were
none to soon, Tor just as we reached shelter
The sun went down with startling rapidity,
leaving the whole place ncarly dark In
these attitudes there is but little twilight.
We crePt into the cave, which did not ap-
pear 10 be very big, and budding ourselves
together for warmth. swallowed what re-
maincd Of our brandy-harrly a mouthful
cach-and tried to forget our miSerieS in
sleep But this the cold was too intense 10
allow us Ia do, | am convinced that at that
great altitude the thermometer cannot have
been less than fourteen or fifteen degrees be-
low freezing point What thus meant to us.
cnervatcd rs we were by hardship, want of
food, and the great heat Of the desert my
reader can imagine better than | can deS-
scribe Suffice is TO say that it was some
thing rs near death from exposure rs have
ever felt There we sat hour after hour
through the bitter night feeling the frost
wander round and nip us now in the finger,
now In the foot and now In the face In
vain did We huddle up closer and closer:
therc was no warmth in our miserable
starved CarcasScs. Sometimes one of us
would drop into an uneasy Slumher for a
few minutes but we could not sleep long,
and perhaps ii was fortunate, for doubt il
we should ever have woke again. | believe 1t
was only by force of will that we kept our
selves alive at all
Not very long before dawn | heari the
Hottcntot Nentyogel, whose teeth had been
chattering all night like castanetS, give
deep sigh, and then his teeth stopped chat
tering. did not think anything OF it at the
time, concluding that he had gone TO sleep.
His back was resting against mine, and il
seemed to grow colder and colder, till at last
II was like ice.
AT length the air began 10 grow gray with
light then swift golden arrows came flash
ing across the snow, and at last the glorious
sun peeped up above the lava wall and
looked in upon our half-fruzen forms and up.
on Nentvogel, sitting there amongst us stone
dead No wonder his back had felt cold
poor fellow. lie had died when hNsr hin,